Bakers & Cooks closes; Primary Oven will move in

Monday

Aug 30, 2010 at 10:23 AMAug 30, 2010 at 1:09 PM

The kitchen at Bakers & Cooks is closed; for that matter, so is the whole store. The utensil emporium marking its fourth anniversary downtown this month was shuttered late Friday — and isn't likely to return.

By Rick AllenStaff writer

The kitchen at Bakers & Cooks is closed; for that matter, so is the whole store.

The utensil emporium marking its fourth anniversary downtown this month was shuttered late Friday — and isn't likely to return.

“We were evicted,” co-owner Marie Harrington said Saturday.

Conceding that she and partner Gene Belden were unable to make their mid-August rent payment of $1,970, she said, “I thought I would have 24 hours from when the papers were served.”

But a locksmith accompanied the serving deputy Friday, Harrington added, and she was told to leave immediately. “At least they let me take my purse” as well as some personal items being used at the store. “There's still food in the refrigerator.”

The building at 128 S.W. Broadway St., just down the hill from the downtown square, won't be empty long. The Primary Oven bakery and restaurant from two blocks farther west is moving in.

“We plan to be in that building by Oct. 1,” Kelley Welsh, who opened Primary Oven at 306 S.W. Broadway four and a half years ago, said this (Monday) morning.

“We'll be closer to downtown,” Welsh said. “I've loved having the gallery and the upstairs dining, but it's been a challenge.”

Mark Debolt, owner of the property at Broadway and Southwest Second Avenue for the last six years, confirmed Primary Oven is slated for the facility.

“It's been through many, many different evolutions,” Debolt said. Since 2000, it's been a Jamaican restaurant, three Thai eateries and a soul food restaurant before Bakers & Cooks opened.

“It's a shame Bakers & Cooks did not succeed,” he added.

Reaction to a Facebook posting late Friday about the Bakers & Cooks closing was swift and disappointed. Within minutes came the first responses.

“So sorry,” wrote one. “Hope another door is opening for you all … may God bless.”

Initially, Bakers & Cooks sold upper-end or one-of-a-kind supplies for the home kitchen. Not long after opening, Harrington and Belden put in a designer kitchen that for a time was used for culinary instruction, but it closed after a few months.

The couple revived cooking classes in the kitchen area a year ago, and earlier this year opened the kitchen for breakfast and lunch as well as cooking classes most evenings. Dining here was very much like at a chef's table; customers could sit at a counter mere inches from cooking surfaces and chat with the chef as he went about preparing their meals.

“We served our last meals on Wednesday,” Harrington said. “It was a happenin' lunch spot; we had a great clientele, but it just wasn't enough to pay the bills.”

She said her current rent woes were related to the resurfacing of Broadway between Pine and Magnolia avenues. “There were times when both Broadway and Second Avenue were closed off. Customers couldn't find a place to park, or a way to get in.”

The resurfacing is mostly complete now; new parking lines were in place by early this (Monday) morning.

Welsh was excited about plans for her new Oven — to be open later, with beer and wine service. “But it'll be the whole market-fresh approach. That will not change,” she said.

Harrington said she's sad that she and Belden “don't have the money to start over.

“But I still have my health, my years of experience, my education. I'm a food scientist, I've got a good-looking resume. I'll land on my feet.”

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